The lead-up to this game is following a similar trajectory to Grand Theft Auto V. At this point we’re in the complete silence phase. A phase that Grand Theft Auto V was in for a very long time. Once Rockstar does officially break their silence, we’ll likely be getting at least a drip feed of news leading up to the release.

So let’s get to whether this is real or not, as forum goers are already trying to debunk whether or not this image is infact legitimate. Fans are doing everything they do in cases where images “leak.” They analyze every single detail about the image, run it through photo analysis tools, look for inconsistencies and try to draw comparisons to things that we’ve previously seen.

In the “it’s a fake” camp, those persons are saying that the character who is front and center in the image doesn’t seem to be leaning on anything. The man walking in the middle of the picture has no shadow, and that the church in the background has the pixelated blur of something that has been photoshopped when running it through a photo editor.

In the “it’s real” camp, some of the animations are similar to what we’ve seen in the trailer. That includes the posture of the front and center character, and the design of the horse.

We’re in the “it could be fake, but Rockstar isn’t saying anything so this is still exciting to think about the possibility of a next-gen RDR” camp. If it is a fake, Rockstar has noone to really blame but themselves, leaving fans hanging for so long with no information about a game as highly anticipated as Red Dead Redemption 2 is just wrong and will ultimately lead to stunts like these.

If it is real, the Old West is going to look glorious in Red Dead Redemption 2. Last we saw, marketing materials had “confirmed” that Red Dead Redemption 2 was still on track to release later this year.

Real or Fake? Let us know in the comments section, below.

Update: The image in question turns out to be from a just recently announced MMO called Wild West Online that draws inspiration from Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption series. More details about Wild West Online here.